Search Engine Marketing: 'Pay per Click' or 'Organic'?

There can be no doubt that search engines are the most cost-effective way of driving traffic to your web site. Literally millions of searches are made by people seeking information or goods or even services every day. However, competition is fierce as there are over 100 million websites in existence. And you can be assured that many of these will compete directly with you in the search engines.

This article will discuss two approaches to search engine marketing: 'Pay per Click' or (PPC) and 'Organic' and list some benefits and tips for each approach.

PAY-PER-CLICK SEARCH ENGINE TRAFFIC

Pay-per-Click, or sponsored advertising, was pioneered by Google in the early 90s through their Google Adwords service. All other major search engines such as Yahoo! and Microsoft MSN now have similar products. To get a listing on these services, you bid an amount you are prepared to pay if someone clicks on that keyword. For example, you might be prepared to pay one dollar every time someone clicks on your advertisement which is displayed when someone does a search on, say, 'dog training'. Typically, your advertisement will appear on the right-hand side of the search engine listings.

PPC is a great way to get targeted traffic quickly and easily to your web site. However, you are competing against many advertisers - some with very large budgets - so you might end up in a bidding war, and to get to the point where it is simply too expensive for you to bid on you all required keywords.

If you are serious about PPC, it's worthwhile getting the insights from an expert. Perry Marshall is considered to be the expert in Google Adwords. Simply Google his name and you will get all the information about his programs which you will require.

ORGANIC SEARCH ENGINE TRAFFIC

This process relies on your websites having high rankings in the search engines. For example, if Google thinks that your site about, say, the dog training is important, informative, and original; it will return your site when a user does is search on their keyword 'dog training'. In general, organic search engine traffic receives 9 times as much traffic as compared to PPC campaigns. It's also worth noting that search engine traffic is of a higher quality than PPC traffic.

The key to getting good search engine ranking is to ensure that your web site is optimised for a particular keyword. This introduces a new discipline: 'Search Engine Optimization' or SEO. Search Engine Optimisation is a complex and specialised area. If you are serious about improving the ranking of your site is worth while getting the advice of experts. Google the term 'SEO' for a comprehensive list of SEO experts in your area.

Russell Clark writes for the website www.promotion-strategies.net.